Expelled and suspended students will be tutored.
By Gail Geraghty
Staff Writer

PARIS – A major intervention program will begin in January to help kids in SAD 17 and SAD 39 who have been expelled or suspended.

The program will provide academic tutoring for the students, who will also be required to do some kind of community service work. A social worker will provide ongoing support and counseling for both the students and their families, said Joan Churchill, director of family services and development at Community Concepts Inc.

“We’re tremendously excited to be working with the schools on this,” said Churchill, who was successful in applying for federal grant funds under the No Child Left Behind Act.

The Maine Department of Education is contracting with Community Concepts to provide $84,000 to SAD 17, and $82,589 to SAD 9, under a 12-month contract to serve students who have either been expelled or given suspensions of five days or more. The students will be referred by administrators of either the middle or high schools in the two districts.

“I’m thrilled that the schools are open to having community services working with the school system.”

Churchill credits her success in securing the grant funds in large part to the pioneering work done two years ago at SAD 17 through its Restorative Justice Program. That program, funding under a juvenile justice program grant, ended when the funds dried up, said John Parsons, SAD 17 special projects director.

By having the students work with a mentor at the school, SAD 17’s Restorative Justice program was able to reduce the days students were given suspension from 2,060 in fiscal year 2001 to 905 in fiscal year 2003, Churchill said.

Churchill said Community Concepts is assigning master-level social workers to work with the students. “They love working with these kids.” The students will be matched with an adult professional in the community to serve as a mentor as they perform community service work, she said.

“We want them to meet people who can show them another way. We want to help kids to see that life isn’t what they think it is, and that school has a reason,” said Churchill.

Parsons said that as things now stand, once a student is expelled by the district’s board of directors, there are no clear guidelines for having that student readmitted. Expelled students are not eligible for any school services, he said.

SAD 17 estimates that about nine to 12 students are expelled each year.

“The student who is expelled is kind of out there floating,” and Churchill’s grant will provide a road map for expelled students and their families, Parsons said.

The social worker will work with the student and his or her family, Churchill said. It may be that the student’s parents will be asked to receive counseling as part of the application for readmittance to the school, he said.

“Sometimes a crisis is a good time to realize that things aren’t working,” she said.

Students will be helped to set goals, which might include taking an anger management class, or agreeing to go to counseling on an ongoing basis once they are back in school, she said. Other students may not be able to cope well in a big school, and need help in gaining admittance to the district’s alternative Streaked Mountain School.

“Sometimes a crisis is a good time to realize that things aren’t working,” she said.

The school district will make the decision on which students are to be referred to the program, she said. The program will serve about 85 students in a year, per district.

“The school will want to see change,” she said.

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